Introduction: Self-managed exercise and nutrition interventions can alleviate pre-frailty and frailty but understanding of adherence to them is lacking. This study aimed to explore the experiences of, and barriers and enablers to, a hospital-to-home self-managed combined exercise and nutrition program for hospitalised older adults living with pre-frailty and frailty.
Methods: A hybrid approach to data- and theory-driven descriptive thematic analysis identified experiences, barriers, and enablers to participation in a 3-month, self-managed, exercise-nutrition, hospital-to-home frailty-support program. Pre-frail and frail older adult patients ≥ 65 years admitted to the acute medical unit at a South Australian tertiary hospital were recruited. Individual semi-structured interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analysed descriptively, using the Theoretical Domains Framework.
Results: The nutrition component of the program found 11 common barriers and 18 common enablers. The exercise component included 14 barriers and 24 enablers. Intentions, Social influences, Environmental context/resource and Emotions served as primary barriers towards adherence to both components. Common enablers for both components included Knowledge, Social identity, Environmental context/resource, Social influences, and Emotions.
Conclusions: This research revealed important factors affecting adherence to a self-managed exercise-nutrition program in pre-frail and frail older adults within the environment, resources, and emotion domains that should be considered when designing other intervention programs in this population group.
Keywords: barriers and enablers; exercise; frailty; nutrition; older adults.